Meaning of word implying

: to express indirectly

: to involve or indicate by inference, association, or necessary consequence rather than by direct statement

a film title that suggests its subject matter

measures implying that bankruptcy was imminent

hinted that she might get the job

intimates that there is more to the situation than meets the eye

insinuated that there were shady dealings

Early reports implied that the judge’s death was not an accident.

His words implied a threat.

War implies fighting and death.

Recent Examples on the Web

What your question implies, and what America is in the middle of a long debate about, is diversity.


—Henry Gass, The Christian Science Monitor, 5 Apr. 2023




Special for The Republic Cocido means nothing more than cooked, but the namesake dish — a boil of beef and seasonal vegetables — has far more richness in flavor and geographic history than the name implies.


—Minerva Orduño Rincón, The Arizona Republic, 30 Mar. 2023




In the series, Dunne’s photos immortalize some of the band’s most pivotal moments, like their Aurora album cover, but it is implied that her career never fully blooms.


—Alicia Ramírez, refinery29.com, 29 Mar. 2023




So why is owner Arte Moreno implying the Angels could move Ohtani this summer?


—Houston Mitchell, Los Angeles Times, 28 Mar. 2023




And being a lawmaker in Cuba does not necessarily imply having a lot of power.


—Patrick Oppmann, CNN, 27 Mar. 2023




Recent developments, such as Trump’s installation of a U.S. military base in Israel, are implied to be part of this master plan, and have certainly escalated tensions in the region.


—Jessica Kiang, Variety, 25 Mar. 2023




Yet genocide implies a deliberate intent to exterminate an entire group of people, and that was decidedly not the objective of all this racial violence.


—Eric Herschthal, The New Republic, 23 Mar. 2023




First full month of legal sports wagering put $301,000 in tax revenue into state coffers It is implied to be free money, right?


—Dan Shaughnessy, BostonGlobe.com, 21 Mar. 2023


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These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word ‘imply.’ Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Etymology

Middle English implien, emplien «to enfold, surround, entangle, involve by inference, contain implicitly,» borrowed from Anglo-French emplier, implier «to involve by inference, entail,» probably adaptation of emplier (variant of empleier, emploier «to entangle, put to use, employ entry 1″) as a vernacular equivalent of Medieval Latin implicāre «to imply, mean by implication,» modeled on parallel verbs in Middle English, as applien «to apply,» replien «to reply entry 1″ and their correspondents in Anglo-French — more at implicate

Note:
The genesis of this verb is idiosyncratic, as it has no correspondent in continental French, and even the Anglo-French examples are—to judge by citations in the Anglo-Norman Dictionary—later than the Middle English examples, which are not much earlier than the fifteenth century. Middle French has impliquer as an adaptation of Latin implicāre, but this method of creating vernacular forms of verbs in -plicāre, though common in French, gained little traction in English. Note late and rare Middle English appliquen «to apply» (from Anglo-French and Middle French appliquer), for which the Oxford English Dictionary has no evidence past the sixteenth century.

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 4

Time Traveler

The first known use of imply was
in the 14th century